The recent cuts at the Miami Herald hit close to home.

McClatchy eliminated 28 jobs at the Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald. Reporters and editors disappeared. Beats disappeared. Among the losses were journalists covering Miami City Hall and Broward County.

We understand those cuts because, on a much smaller scale, we're living through our own.

You've probably noticed OutSFL getting thinner. Most weeks, we're now at 16 pages. I recall a day when our predecessor, SFGN, topped 100 pages in a single week.

We've scaled back content and expenses. Our one full-time editorial staffer is now part-time.

Those aren't decisions we wanted to make. They're the reality of producing local journalism in an increasingly difficult environment.

And every time a newsroom shrinks, something else shrinks with it: the number of government meetings someone can attend, records someone can request, tips someone can chase and powerful people someone can question.

The First Amendment guarantees freedom of the press. It doesn't guarantee there will always be enough reporters around to exercise it.

The Herald once had something particularly important to our community: Steve Rothaus.

For more than two decades, Steve covered LGBTQ issues for the Herald and became a pioneer of the beat. When he retired in 2019, the Herald didn't replace its dedicated LGBTQ reporter.

Fortunately for us, Steve didn't stop writing. He now sometimes writes for OutSFL.

As the newsrooms around us shrink, publications like ours become even more important to ensuring LGBTQ South Florida is consistently covered.

Not just during Pride Month. Every week.

We've even tried to expand that coverage.

Earlier this year, we launched OutPBC, a weekly newsletter devoted to Palm Beach County's LGBTQ community.

So far, not a single advertiser has signed on to support it.

That's sobering.

We're producing the newsletter, finding the stories, compiling the events and highlighting the people and organizations doing important work there. But journalism cannot indefinitely operate on goodwill and good intentions.

We've also invested in the next generation. Through OutFAU, our student-run news initiative at Florida Atlantic University, we're giving young journalists opportunities to report, write and learn the craft. And we've also launched a scholarship to help support aspiring journalists.

Even as resources get tighter, we're still investing in what comes next.

The financial model that once supported publications like ours has changed dramatically. National advertising has largely dried up over the last several years, putting even more pressure on our local community to keep us afloat.

So we've adapted.

We've created new ways for readers to help through donations and memberships. We've worked with nonprofits to advertise their organizations and events while simultaneously supporting the journalism serving their community.

And we now regularly apply for grants.

We're incredibly grateful that OutSFL recently received a grant from Press Forward South Florida.

But a grant here and a grant there isn't sustainability.

And sustainability is what we need.

I was recently reminded just how expensive good journalism can be.

I spoke with the Ocala Gazette, an independent newspaper like OutSFL, about its in-depth reporting on Marion County's jail facilities. I was told the series may have ultimately cost the newspaper around $100,000 when accounting for all of the resources devoted to reporting it.

The story needed to be told. Telling it wasn't cheap.

Good journalism takes time. Investigative journalism can take months. It means paying reporters to dig through records, conduct interviews, verify facts and keep digging even when there's nothing to publish that day.

That's what accountability can cost.

Our newspaper is free. Our website is free. Our newsletters are free.

The work we do is not.

For years we've heard the same question: Who will hold government and those in power accountable as local newspapers continue to shrink? Who will tell our stories if local newsrooms disappear?

It's no longer a theoretical question.

It's the reality we're living in.

Advertising still matters enormously. So do memberships, donations, grants and nonprofit partnerships. Independent local journalism increasingly depends on all of them working together.

Many people already pay for journalism, whether it's a local newspaper or a national publication. That's encouraging. It means people still recognize that news has value.

But I'd ask those readers to think about where those dollars go.

If the journalism produced in your own community matters to you, consider putting some of that support here, too.

Become a member. Make a donation. Advertise your business. If you're involved with a nonprofit, consider putting some of your communications budget toward local LGBTQ media.

Some of our readers have found another way to support both OutSFL and their favorite nonprofit: they make a donation and ask that the money be used to advertise that organization in our pages.

The nonprofit gets exposure. OutSFL gets support. And those dollars stay right here, working in the community.

Everyone wins.

Because the cruel irony is that as other South Florida newsrooms shrink, the need for OutSFL grows.

At precisely the same time, the financial pressure on us is growing too.

The freedom of the press belongs to everyone.

But keeping reporters around to exercise that freedom requires something more than believing journalism is important.

It requires supporting it.

A free press isn't free.

You can donate here.